Color photographs which have been widely popularized at present have progressed to the extent that they can be obtained more quickly and easily in any place by the progress of the light-sensitive materials themselves and the photographic processing techniques. In particular, in the field of color prints, the production of color prints has been practiced according to various purposes by the development of a concentrated processing system called color laboratory having a production place where high-speed printers, large-scale photographic processors, etc., for mass production are disposed, and a dispersed processing system using small-sized printer processors each called "mini-labo." or a miniature laboratory disposed in store. Recently, by the practical use of a photographic light-sensitive material using a high silver chloride emulsion and the processing process disclosed in PCT WO 88/04534, photographic processing has been quickened more and more.
Simulatneously with such an investigation of quickening photographic processing, the improvement of the stability of the image quality of prints obtained has always been required for increasing the production efficiency of color prints.
For this purpose, the stabilized performance of color photographic papers being used for producing color prints is important.
Considering the actual circumstances of the markets of color prints as described above, the requirement for the performance stability of color photographic papers has been more increased. That is, in the large laboratory making a mass production of color prints, if the performance of each color photographic paper is stabilized, color prints can be produced by establishing the printing condition of a high-speed printer at a constant, whereby the efficiency is greatly increased. Also, in the production of color prints using a "mini-labo." disposed in a store, etc., it is frequently difficult to obtain a skilled operator and hence the stabilized perforance of color photographic papers directly relates to the improvement of the quality and the yield of the color prints.
Accordingly, the performance stabilization of photographic light-sensitive materials at the production thereof was a very important theme for providing the photographic light-sensitive materials capable of producing color prints of a high quality at a high efficiency.
In the photographic light-sensitive material for color photographs, a blue-sensitive emulsion layer, a green-sensitive emulsion layer, and a red-sensitive emulsion layer are formed for the purpose of carrying out a color reproduction of a subtractive color process, and the construction that each emulsion layer contains a compound capable of coloring into a dye corresponding to the complementary color of the light sensitive to the emulsion layer is used.
The silver halide emulsion which is a light-sensitive element is spectrally sensitized for imparting sensitivity to the light of a desired wavelength region to the silver halide emulsion. In general, the spectral sensitization is carried out by adsorbing a so-called spectral sensitizing dye, i.e., the dye having an absorption in the desired wavelength region, to the silver halide grains.
The stability of the performance of a photographic light-sensitive material is greatly influenced by the stability of the spectral sensitization. That is, if the spectral sensitization is unstable, the performance change caused by the change of the adsorbed state of spectral sensitizing dyes occurs by the deviation of the conditions at the production of the photographic light-sensitive materials and by storing the products for a long period of time. In particular, such a problem severely occurs in the case of using a silver halide emulsion having a high silver chloride content, which is advantageously used for quickening the processing time and for reducing the replenishing amounts, and hence the development of the technique for solving the problem has been desired. Also, for preventing the occurrence of putrefaction, etc., in the production steps of photographic light-sensitive materials, the use of various antiseptics is disclosed in JP-A-61-233743 (the term "JP-A" as used herein means an "unexamined published Japanese patent application") but it has been found that when the antiseptics are used, the foregoing unstability is further increased and the technique for solving the problem has been desired.
On the other hand, from the requirement of lowering waste liquids in photographic processing, the attempt of reducing the replenishing amounts of the processing liquids has been continued and a so-called low replenishing type processing system has been increased. However, in such a low-replenishing processing, there is a problem that when continuous processing of photographic light-sensitive materials is carried out for a long period of time, depositions frequently form in processing liquids and by attaching the depositions onto rollers, etc., a stripe-like defect called streaks is formed on the prints obtained.
JP-A-1-303438 describes that for preventing the occurrence of such depositions, the reduction of the content of calcium in the photographic light-sensitive materials is effective. Therefore, it has been attempted to produce light-sensitive materials using materials having a low content of calcium. However, when the content of calcium in light-sensitive materials is reduced, the photographic performence of the light-sensitive materials during production as described above is more liable to deviate, and hence the development of of a technique capable of obtaining both the processing stability and the production stability has been strongly pursued.